President Biden thanked his Mexican counterpart, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, on Thursday for capturing one of the most wanted and brutal criminals in Mexico and the US, an alleged fentanyl trafficker accused of feeding rival cartel members to tigers.
Mexican troops captured Nestor Isidro Perez Salas, known as “El Nini,” on Wednesday.
Perez Salas is the head of security for the “Chapitos” wing of the notorious Sinaloa Cartel, a group the Drug Enforcement Administration says is responsible for the massive influx of fentanyl into the US over the past several years.
“I want to thank President Lopez Obrador and the Mexican Army and special forces for successfully capturing El Nini, and express our appreciation for the brave men and women of the Mexican security forces who conducted this successful operation to capture him,” Biden, 81, said in a statement issued by the White House.
Mexico’s National Guard has arrested the alleged security chief of a Sinaloa cartel clan, Nestor Isidro Perez Salas, also known as “El Nini.”Sedena
The president stated that “both our countries are safer with him in prison and facing justice for his crimes.”
In February 2021, a federal grand jury in Washington, DC, returned an indictment against Perez Salas on charges of conspiracy to traffic cocaine and methamphetamine, possession of machine guns and destructive devices and witness tampering.
A New York grand jury returned a second indictment against the cartel’s indicted security chief in April, accusing El Nini and nearly two dozen co-conspirators of engaging in an ongoing criminal enterprise, a fentanyl importation conspiracy, a money laundering conspiracy and various other crimes.
President Joe Biden speaks during a meeting on combating fentanyl, in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, on Nov. 21, 2023. AP
The State Department offered a $3 million reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction shortly after the second indictment, which details the horrific allegations against the cartel’s security forces run by Perez Salas, known as the “Ninis.”
The New York indictment describes the Ninis as “a very violent group of security personnel for Chapitos” led and commanded by Perez Salas.
In 2017, Perez Salas and his henchmen “captured, tortured, and killed two Mexican federal law enforcement officers,” one of whom had a corkscrew inserted into his muscles and pulled out before Ninis “poured hot chili into his open wounds and nose, ” according to the indictment.
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador speaks during a press conference in Acapulco, Mexico on November 23, 2023. AFP via Getty Images
After that, one of the conspirators Perez Salas is said to have shot dead the officer.
Interrogation targets are routinely taken by Perez Salas and his followers to the Sinaloa ranch of Ivan Archivaldo Guzman Salazar – a Chapitos leader and son of jailed Mexican drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzman – where he and his brother breed and keep tigers as pets , according to the indictment.
Those who were not shot were “fed dead or alive” to the tigers.
Ninis Perez Salas is also accused of testing their fentanyl on rivals and kidnapped addicts, who injected them until they overdosed.
In one instance, Ninis “experimented on a woman they were supposed to shoot” and “injected her repeatedly with a lower potency of fentanyl until she overdosed and died,” according to the indictment.
Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement Thursday that he had spoken with Mexico’s Attorney General Alejandro Gertz Manero and thanked him for the arrest of Perez Salas.
“We are now seeking the speedy extradition of El Nini from Mexico to face justice here in the United States,” Garland added.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
